Mark Appel says he felt ‘entitled to certain things’

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Mark Appel was roughed up for 10 runs in 1 1/3 innings for High Class A Lancaster on Saturday. (Melissa Phillip/Houston Chronicle)

After what might be the worst outing Mark Appel has ever experienced as a baseball player, he opened up Sunday in an interview on SiriusXM’s MLB Network Radio.

Appel, the top pick in last year’s draft, has had a whirlwind four months, and last night in his first minor league start in more than a month, allowed 10 runs in 1 1/3 innings for High Class A Lancaster.

Here’s what Appel had to say on the radio:

“There’s so many things that I can improve on. And I think that’ll be the same answer regardless of how my last outing was, or one day if I hope to make it to the bigs, there’s always things I can continue to work on. This season, I’m not going to blow smoke or anything like that, this season really hasn’t gone the way that I want it to, but the beauty of that is it’s in the past. If I really dwell on the past, it’ll really just — it’ll wear me down. Trying to focus on the negatives is not a good thing, so I woke up today, I’m ready to go to work, ready to get the work that I need to prepare myself for the next outing. I think it’s a matter of just getting my feet wet again.

“This whole season has been a little strange, an appendectomy before spring training, having a short spring training, and then breaking camp and pitching every fourth day and just not being able to respond to that because physically I don’t think I was there after the surgery. And then going back to Florida and now being back in California and then having that start I had last night, I sat back last night, I was like, ‘Man, what’s going on?’ God must be up to something, something big. But I have no idea what it is. It’s those rough times and it’s those times in the desert that really define your character. It could be so easy to just give up in certain situations, when, I mean — 10 runs in an inning and a third, I don’t think I’ve ever had a start that’s that bad in my life, you know? You might consider I’m at the low of lows, but that’s nothing to be ashamed of, or nothing to get down on. It’s just more desire, more motivation to keep working and to keep getting better. And really, it’s humbling.

“Having the confidence of knowing that you’re the first overall pick in last year’s draft, you should be the top of the top right now, and I mean, it’s humbling. This game is very humbling. But it’s a good thing, because it’ll give me that drive, that desire, that, motivation to continue to working, to continue to be faithful, both to God, and to my teammates, my coaches, myself, the things that I need to do. I’ll come back and I’ll respond. Don’t know exactly when that will be, I hope it’ll be next game and I’m going to work and prepare like I have every other game to be able to be my best, but I think the draft is definitely a starting point, and when you lose sight of that, you can — it could really get you. I think I lost sight of that a little bit, and I think I felt entitled to certain things, and you know I’m actually really gracious and really appreciative of this kind of desert time that I’m going through right now because I know it’ll make me that much better in the end.”